6: Missed Miscarriage
One of the most unfortunate phenomenons that black spotting and bleeding lead to is missed miscarriage. It is when the embryo stops developing but has not been released by the body after four or more weeks.
The chances of a pregnancy ending in a miscarriage are between 10-20%. Most of these miscarriages happen even before a fetus reaches 10 weeks’ gestation.
Sadly, you may not experience symptoms of a miscarriage and the only way of knowing about it is when they undergo a routine ultrasound.
Other symptoms may include cramping, faintness, etc.
7: Retained Menses and Thick Black Discharge
Hematocolpos, otherwise known as retained menses, is a condition in which menstrual blood is blocked from exiting the cervix, uterus or vagina. Due to this, the blood may turn black as it is being retained. This blockage can be caused by a congenital issue with the vaginal septum, or hymen. In small cases, it may be caused by the absence of a cervix (cervical agenesis).
Some women may not even experience any symptoms, whereas others may find that the symptoms are cyclical. This means that they happen in times of an expected menstrual cycle.
If the blockage gets severe, you may get amenorrhea or no menstruation at all. Other complications can include adhesions, pain and endometriosis.
8: Emergency Contraception
One of the possible causes of black, or dark brown vaginal discharge is the morning after pill. You might notice some dark-coloured discharge between two regular periods.
9: Stress
High levels of stress over a period of time can do all kinds of crazy things to your period, including making them very irregular. You could also experience some brown or black discharge or spotting between periods as a result of this.
Basically, your body is fighting for survival, and things like production of reproductive hormones become less important.
10: Ovarian Cyst
Another possible cause for black discharge is a cyst in the ovaries. As long as they don’t rupture, they’re usually not a big problem.
However, when they do rupture, cysts can cause some serious bleeding. It may look like black or brown discharge. Visit your doctor because this can be a potentially serious situation.
11: Cervical Cancer
This is a serious condition in which you may have some spotting or unusual coloured discharge at random times. You may also notice that your discharge is foul-smelling.
What’s the moral of this story? If you detect any changes in your menstrual cycle, or usual discharge, please visit your doctor.
It may be nothing, but it could also be a serious problem. It’s worth getting checked out.
12: Hormonal Birth Control
If you’re a woman on hormonal birth control, you may notice some dark spotting mid-cycle. This is because you might have a thinner uterine lining and may not get a regular period. Instead, you could just have some dark spotting. It can sometimes look like black discharge.
13: Cervical Stenosis
This is a serious problem that mostly occurs in older women and can cause some dark coloured discharge. It’s the narrowing of the cervix which can result in the slowing of menstrual flow.
Because the menstrual fluid is exposed to the air for a very long period of time, it may be very dark in color.
14: Endometriosis
This painful disorder is when tissue that normally grows in the uterus grows outside of it in other reproductive organs (the Fallopian tubes or ovaries for example). These tissues can have build-ups of thick, black blood.
15: Pelvic Inflammatory Disease
PID is usually the result of an untreated STI. It’s an infection of the female reproductive tract, and one of the symptoms can be a very dark coloured discharge (along with pelvic pain, fever, painful periods or urination, etc.)
16: Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS)
This hormonal imbalance can cause irregular bleeding that may look like dark discharge. Some other symptoms include irregular periods, acne, excessive facial or body hair, pelvic pain, infertility and patches of dark skin on the body.
17: A Dry Vagina
If you have some brownish discharge, especially after menopause when the walls of the vagina get very thin, it could be that you have a very dry vagina.
This symptom can also happen during perimenopause, which happens around the age of 50, and is characterized by changing hormone levels.
18: Other Causes for Black Discharge
There are a number of other reasons for darker-coloured vaginal discharge.
